Adventures in Buying Sand

By Jen Leo | Permalink | 1 comment | August 25th, 2003 | Trackback

Here's a funny account of book buying that came to my inbox today. I love it when strangers write in.

Dear Friends,
While on the road, I decided to stop in at a typical mall
bookstore and see if they had a copy of SIMB. This particular mall bookstore happened to be located in the town of LaVale, Maryland. Never heard of it? I’m not surprised. LaVale is located in the mountains of western Maryland just a good spit from the state lines of West Virginia on one side and Pennsylvania on the other. Needless to say, this in not much of a book town.

I perused the travel section, but didn’t see SIMB. Disappointed, I headed for the door. A clerk stopped me on the way out.

“Can I help you find something?” she asked.

“Maybe,” I said. “I’m looking for Sand In My Bra.” Her helpful questioning looked swiftly morphed into pursed-lipped annoyance.

“I don’t think I can help you with that,” she wheezed. No! I didn’t mean THAT! I yelped internally.

“It’s a travel book. A travel humor book. A Women’s travel humor book.”

“Oh,” my annoyed friend said, “I’ve never heard of it.” Why did this not surprise me?

“Maybe if you looked it up . . .” She obliged. They had one copy on hand.

She plucked the book from the shelf and gave it a good, long look.

“I hear it’s great,” I babbled. “I even read a couple of
chapters on the Internet. That picture is from the Burning Man festivities.

There’s also this really funny story of a woman losing her underwear in Abu Dhabi . . .”

I recently lost my ill-fitting pants while running through the airport in Cleveland. Not quite the same, but I could relate.

“Well,” the clerk clucked, “to each their own.”

Indeed.

Thanks for the great read. I’m enjoying the hilarious tales of
woe and disaster.

Best Wishes,
Jessie J. Ellis

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